Lizard Heads, Frogs, Crickets: The Things We Find in Our Lunch Salads

By Mike Dang March 12, 2014

Yesterday, a customer from a Manhattan chain restaurant found the head of a lizard in her salad:

Robin Sandusky, a theatrical coordinator, said she ordered a kale salad from a Guy & Gallard store in Chelsea for delivery to her workplace. She began eating the salad when she spotted what she thought was a pea.

“I turned it over, and I could see its eye,” she told NBC 4 New York.

Sandusky called the store and asked for a refund. She said she declined the store’s offer for a replacement salad.

When I read about this news, I was slightly repulsed but also got a feeling of deja vu. Hadn’t this just happened?

Sure enough, right before New Year’s an employee at the Wall Street Journal found a dead frog in her salad from the chain restaurant Pret A Manger.

Pret issued the following statement after the incident:

At Pret A Manger, we take issues like this very seriously. Our lettuce is sourced from farms that do not use any pesticides on its produce, therefore organic matter does very rarely manage to pass through our production process. We are currently looking into this issue to make every effort that this does not happen again.

Organic matter does very rarely manage to pass through our production process.

And yet, it’s not so rare. A quick Google search reveals that in 2012, an employee at a Hartford, Conn. radio station found a cricket in his salad.

And it’s not just salads we buy in chain restaurants.

In 2010, a science writer in Vancouver wrote about the craziest thing he ever found in a bag of spinach his wife brought home: a praying mantis.

Every time I buy a salad, I’m going to look at it carefully. Or maybe not. Maybe I should just close my eyes and consume without worry. Maybe I shouldn’t live my life afraid of what I will find in my salad.

Photo: Matt Seppings

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